Bomi Lake

I took the day off today and we drove up to Bomi Lake. It is an old iron ore and diamond mine formerly operated by an American company about 2 hours from Monrovia. It almost got a lot longer when we were stopped at a checkpoint and realized we didn't have passports for Jamie and the boys. Luckily the Immigration official let us through with a warning.

The UN now runs a couple operations out of the area. A battalion of Pakistani troops is stationed in the area (Pak Bat) and fixed up an observation point and recreation area. Both are starting to fall apart now, but still provide good areas for pictures and swimming.

Here's a view from the "Pak Point"

The swimming area. The water is very clear and there are quite a few Tilapia swimming around through the rocks. There's even an old wood diving board that we were able to dive off.
The sign says "Pakistan Gazebo, const by Pak engr 7"
They even have a Pineapple orchard...or at least used to.
The boys playing in the water.
A group of Nigerian and Pakistani UN staff came by and wanted pictures with the family. You can see one of the Pakistani soldiers holding Blessing. He said he has a one year old boy back home that he's missing.
A view of nearby Tubmanburg from the Pak Point observation area.
Christopher and Colton...not sure what they were doing.
The view north into Gbarpolu County.
An old sign in Tubmanburg on an old Bomi Evangelical Church. SIM started as "Sudan Interior Mission" but later changed to "Serving In Mission".

Christopher's Bday and Blessing update

Christopher turned 14 on Sunday. He didn't want to make too big of a deal about it, so we didn't really have a party for him. We went out to lunch after church and then to Kendeja to their pool to play around. Here are the boys in the pool.

Blessing and Jamie sunning poolside.

Another picture of Blessing and Jamie before church.

Saturday night gathering at the Chapman's. Every other Saturday they have worship with other expats and Liberians. Worship is lead by the hit duo, Dr. Doctor.

The boys preparing for worship time...

vocabulary

I won't go into Liberia's history, but if you don't know how the Republic was formed you can read about it here. The freed slaves who settled here brought with them an American style government, religion, customs and of course English. The English was mixed over the years with the tribal languages (or dialects) from the 16+/- indigenous tribes to get the Liberian English that they have today.

Liberian English has a few basic differences that stem from this mixture. The first is the dropping of all hard sounds at the ends of words. A word like "Plate" would sound more like "Play". A name like "Amos" becomes "Amo". All of the local dialects had similar language patterns. A look at the names of the tribes and cities shows the tendency to end in vowels, tribes like Kpelle, Kissi, Bassa and cities like Ganta, Gbanga, and Kakata. Other typical differences are using a hard "T" sound for "TH" (Thinker's Village nearby ELWA is Tinker's Village for example). The "sk" combination comes out as "ks" typically (ask sounds like aks or ax).

There are some words that were used back in the 1800's that America has long since dropped, but Liberia still uses. You'll see a little more about that below.

Another common expression is to add an "-oh" at the end of a word for emphasis. Such as "The weather is hot-oh" or "I sorry-o". Below are a few other expressions that are common in Liberia, but a little different than the usage in America, or just seldom used in America anymore.

(note - my examples are in American English rather than trying to spell out the words as they actually sound)

embarrass - to bother - "I don't want to embarrass you, if you're busy now I can come back later"

guaranteed - better quality - "Don't buy that widget, it is not guaranteed" Note that it has nothing to do with a warranty or any vendor standing behind the product.

so so so - similar to how we'd use blah blah blah or "he said this and that".

so so - all, consistent or similar - "The Oettels and Balls have so-so girls" or "the yard is so-so sand"

so - that direction - typical when giving directions "go so" while the person talking indicates a direction.

ever since - a non specific unit of time - "That house has been that way ever since" with since always the end of the sentence...no length or timeframe is given.

small - can be used meaning a little, such as "move the board small more" or often used as an answer when someone asks how they are doing "trying small"

vexed - same real meaning as in US, it is just used often here whenever someone is angry.

reaching - leaving or going - "OK, I finished here and I'm reaching". Or if someone is reaching, you can be kind and "carry" them in your car.

finished - gone - "the fuel is finished"

dress back - move back

Current - power - "My phone has no current" (or current is finished)

Dry/reducing - skinny/losing weight

Boots - shoes, especially soccer cleats.

Slippers - flip flops

Plat - braid hair

Rogue - thief

Take time - be careful

Hold your foot - I beg you. Beg is also used plenty in Liberian English.

After living here a year I understand people...most of the time. Sometimes I still struggle and think I haven't progressed much in my learning, until we have visitors. Having my brother and sister in law and parents visit and struggle to understand things helps to realize how far my comprehension has come.

There are a series of Liberian English videos on Youtube that you can check out. If you go to the fathers advice to his son the chicken rogue you can go to other videos on the sidebar.

haircuts

As dry season fast approaches Jamie decided it was time for the boys to get haircuts on Sunday. Most Liberians will tell you October 15th is the date rainy season promptly ends and dry season begins, although I've also heard November 2nd and a couple other dates. It has been a relatively dry rainy season with around 60-70 inches of rain, although it has dumped about 7 inches in the past week here at ELWA.

In any event the days have been getting warmer and the boys needed to lose some hair. We brought with us our clippers that I think I've had since high school. They've been on the decline the last couple years, but I haven't been able to find a set of clippers that work as well as they do (we bought two pairs last year that did not work well).

I started off with Colton and halfway through...the guard fell off. It is the first time that has ever happened with these clippers, so my reaction was...a little slow. The clippers shaved about a 3" square section on the back of his head, right down to his scalp. After a little discussion we decided it would be best just to shave the rest of the sides and back of his head. Colton is not a big fan of haircuts and short hair, so as you can imagine he wasn't very pleased with the results. He thought I should compensate him for the loss of his hair.

So then it was Kobe's turn...and yep, it happened to him too. I made it all the way to the end and got a little too confident. It cut out a section down by his neck, so we decided not to shave all of his hair off and just square up the shaved portion.

Now where did Christopher go...

School

We've talked before about visiting Addy's Hope Orphanage. A group of people from the US have made a couple trips out this year to build a new Orphanage for them on the road to Marshall. The new orphanage is just a mile or two from a school that offered to take the children for free, if they could furnish their own uniforms. The money was raised for the uniforms and the children started attending last week.

One of the nannies asked if we could come out and take a picture of all the children in their uniforms. They are very excited to have uniforms and be attending school. I'm sure many, if not most, of the children have never been able to go to school.

Waiting for their picture...and school.

The Group Photo

Outside with a thumbs up.

It is right at the end of rainy season here, but it was really pouring down rain today. Here's a chicken at the orphanage trying to hide from the downpour.

So when we were finished taking pictures the nannies asked if I'd drive the kids to the couple miles to the school so they didn't get drenched. Here was the smaller load with only 12 kids in the car.